Mark's Izakaya

Skyrim

2012-02-01T10:59:00.003+01:00

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim has been awarded game of the year awards by multiple gaming site. It’s an epic fantasy role playing game from Bethesda, the makers of Oblivion and Fallout 3. And it has dragons in it! Sounds like a winner, and it was supposed to be the game that I would loose myself in these coming months. But after playing it for a dozen hour I’ve descided to stop. Why? Let me first put forward that Skyrim is not a bad game, on the contrary. But it’s a game that manages to connect with me. So the reasons are mostly personal.

The world of Skyrim is breathtaking. The environments, cities and dungeons in the game are all beautifully rendered. Especially the way light and wethereffects are used is very impressive. If I compare this game to theater, the developers have managed to create an amazing stage. Maybe the most amazing one in a game ever.

But it goes wrong with filling this world, there is a wide gap between it and the people and creatures populating it. The world of Skyrim feels lifeless and lacks consitency. It’s a stage with too few props and actors without personality or soul that give wooden performances. Compared to cities in games like Fable or Assassin’s Creed that feel alive, in Skyrim I feel like walking around town after a plague epidemic where the few survivors walk around in a shocked state repeating the same sentences over and over again. In the dozen hours I played the game I didn’t meet one interesting character. They all look and sound the same and have the same animation routines. The NPC’s in Skyrim are not so much characters but quest vending machines. You go through all the dialogue options and a quest rolls out a the end.

But because the NPC’s leave me cold, so do the quests. Mostly they involve fetching something or clearing a dungeon of bandits or monsters. These dungeons are quite linear and the enemies lack any form of A.I. making fighting them very boring. Enemies usually just run at you with a melee weapon or shoot at you from a distance with arrows or spells. The fun of fighting enemies in these types of games lies in figuring out their strenghts and weaknesses and changing your tactics accordingly. In Skyrim a combination of hitting them on the head repeately and using health potions brings succes every time. You can customize your character and there is a big skill tree to choose from, but these seem mostly aimed at offering the player more creative manners of dispossing enemies. The main challenge I experienced was item management, figuring out how to carry as much valuable loot as possible back to town to sell.

There is an epic backstory involving a civil war, dragons and elves. But it is nothing special and I am growing bored with the cliché “Dungeons & Dragons” and “Lord of the Rings” fantasy setting. Game of Thrones showed how it is possible to bring a fresh spin to this genre by keeping fantasy elements in the background and focussing on political intrigues and characters that have depth. Skyrim does none of these things.

Somehow Skyrims feels like too much. There are too many locations, too many quests and too many choices and possibilities to customize your character. As a result it misses depth, feels ditached and inconsistent but also overwhelming. The question I asked myself was: do I want to spend 200+ hours of my free time in the world of Skyrim doing what feels like repetitive tasks? The answer was no.

I believed my taste for games as changed these past years, or to put it another way: my lifestyle has changed which forces me to be more critical how I spend my available free gametime. Looking at the games I enjoyed the most these recent months; Ghost Trick, Portal 2, Deus Ex, Uncharted 3 and Gears of War 3, it appears I no longer care for epic role playing games where you have to create your own experience and that take forever to complete. I am now looking for shorter games that put you right in the action but that still offer depth, a great story or a unique gameplay experience.

Role Playing Games are still games that I enjoy playing. But to dedicate the amount of time required they have to be very special to hold my interest. Games like Skyrim and the recent Final Fantasy games are simply not good enough anymore.

Slow movie weekend

2011-12-05T10:52:00.000+01:00

This weekend I rewatched Sofi Coppola’s Somewhere and I saw Nicolas Winding Refn’s Drive for the first time. I can say that these where two of the best movies I saw in 2011.

Both can be called slow, but I’d rather describe them as movies that try to tell a story or convey emotions visually instead of through dialogue or a lot of scenes. This is achieved through a combination of beautiful cinematography, long takes, an amazing soundtrack and minimal dialogue. I really like these kinds of movies, they get stuck in my head and I love how there are so many details to the story that are left to the viewer to piece together.

This ends the similarities between both films since their story is very different. Somewhere is a drama that follows Johnny Marco, a famous actor that despite having money, fame, professional succes and regular casual sex with beautiful woman still manages to be trapped in an existential crisis. When his ex-wife suffers an unexplained breakdown and goes away, she leaves Cleo, their 11-year-old daughter, with him. They spend time together and her presence helps Marco mature and accept adult responsibility. As important as the main characters is the setting, the Chateau Marmont in Los Angeles, a well-known Hollywood hotel.

Drive is a crime neo-noir drama film about a Hollywood stunt performer who moonlights as a getaway driver who has a contract put on him after a heist gone wrong. Drive is very much a movies movie, a film full of influences and references to other movies. It reminded me the most of movies and TV-series that Michael Mann use to make in the eighties, like Miami Vice or Thief. Not just the setting or story, but also because of the music and the air of undeniable cool that is prevalent throughout the movie. Despite these influence, Drive still feels fresh and contemporary. It’s a violent crime movie without over the top car chases or shout-outs. The bloody violence, when it comes, is sudden and realistic making for some very intense viewing.

I highly recommed both movies, it is nice to see that movies like this still get made and are successful in this age of mindless 3D blockbusters.

Goje vla ies dun van laer en diek van sjmaer

2011-10-11T09:42:00.000+02:00

The title of this blog is a Limburg expression in dialect meaning: “a good vlaai should have a thin bottom and a thick filling”. For people who are unfamiliar with vlaai, it is a pastry that is associated with the southernmost Dutch province of Limburg. So much so that it is often called Limburgse Vlaai.

Vlaai has been on my mind a lot these past weeks because my girlfriend had to write a column about it for a Japanese website that covers sweets from all over the world. Since in Japanese one character equals one word, what on first sight appears to be a short column can actually contain a lot of information. That requires a lot of research and as the housemate from Limburg I was the first person she asked. I have been eating vlaai my whole life but it was quite surprising to realize how little I actually knew about it.

Vlaai is a circular pastry and consists of a thin bottom of dough (usually around 27 or 30 cm wide) of which the sides are made to stick out. It is then filled with sugered fruits like gooseberries, cherries, prunes, apples, abricots or rice porridge. The top of the vlaai can be left open or (partially) closed with crumble or strips of dough. After baking, the top of the vlaai is often decorated with wiped cream, chocolate or crushed nuts. The main difference from other pastries is the bottom: the vlaai dough is much lighter than other pastries and has more the consistency of bread. Because the vlaai has a firm bottom, it is not uncommon to just eat a piece out of your hand without a plate or cutlery. Vlaai should been eaten as fresh as possible, than it is the best.

Vlaai has been around for a long time, it probably was first made by the Germanic tribes that populated the Northern parts of Europe before Roman times 2000-3000 yeas ago. They used to make pastries filled with honey or jam. Vlaaien are also pictured in a painting of the Belgian painter Pieter Brueghel (1525) and a recipe for a vlaai was found in a cookbook dating from 1593.

The vlaai as we know it today originated in the early 1900’s in the southern Dutch town of Weert. A woman called Maria Hubertina Hendrix used to sell them at the railway station. From there it spread to the rest of Holland and became very popular, although not has popular as in the south. Backing and eating vlaai is a tradition in Limburg. Housewives use to bake loads of them for birthdays, weddings, village fairs and baptisms. Nowadays, most people just buy them at the bakery. When you visit people in Limburg don’t be surprised if you are offered a piece of vlaai. A typical vlaai is cut into 8 or 10 points, so individual pieces are pretty large. That is one of the differences between the south of Holland (catholic) and the north (protestant), where people are considered more modest and stingy. A common expression in Limburg is that in Limburg you get a piece of vlaai, and in Holland (the north) they offer you a chocolate sprinkle and say “have a bonbon”.

While French and Italians tend to gush about their bread and patisserie and make it appear more sophisticated than it actually is, Dutch are more modest. It’s cultural and vlaai is considered a simple dish for the common man, so there is not much to tell about it. “Do maar gewoon, dan doe je al gek genoeg” is also a well known Dutch expression that basically means one should act without attracting attention to oneself.

I for one do not share this opinion and am currently planning to open a vlaai shop in Omotesando. I might not be able to compete with stuck up French patissiers at first, but I should be able to take on Starbuck, Mister Donut and those awful noodled-filled buns or hot dog croissants.

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet

2011-10-07T13:51:00.003+02:00

I have just finished reading The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell, and it is trully one of the best books I have read in a long while.

It is a historical novel set during the late 18th century in the VOC (Dutch East Indies Company) trading post of Dejima in the harbor of Nagasaki, Japan. The book tells the story of Jacob de Zoet, a Dutch clerk who is assigned to Dejima and his encounters with corrupt traders, scholars and officials. He experiences Japanese culture and (of course) falls in love with a beautiful Japanese woman. I can relate.

I have always been very interested in History, and lately I have been reading up on Japanese history. But like everyone else, I started by reading about the periods of the warring states and World War 2. This mean I did not know much about the so called Sakoku period during which no foreigner could enter, nor could any Japanese leave the country on penalty of death. This period lasted from 1633 until 1853 and during this time the only European influence permitted was the Dutch factory (trading post) at Dejima.

I learned a lot of things I didn’t know about by reading this book and doing some research online using Wikipedia. Like the collapse of the VOC due to greed and corruption. Or that for four years during the Napoleonic Wars, when Holland was occupied by France and the VOC possessions where taken by Great Britain, Deijima was the only place in the world where the Dutch flag still flew. Also, there are a lot of little known incidents that happened during this period. The role the Dutch played during the Shimabara Rebellion, the Breskens incident when a Dutch crew was seduced by 11 Japanese woman or the bombardement of Dejiman and Nagasaki by the Britisch warship The Phaeton.

It is also interesting to look at Deijima from the Japanese perspective. For hundreds of years it was known throughout Japan as a center of medicine, military science, and astronomy. It was the only window to the outside world and knowledge. As a result many samurai traveled there for "Dutch studies" (Rangaku).

As a Dutchman, it has been very interesting to read about this period of shared history between the Netherlands and Japan. The overall story of the book is very good too, although the turn the books takes during the second part does resemble something you would except in a cheap airport novel. Fortunatly, this part is not long and doesn’t outstay it’s welcome.

Another point of criticism is that the pace of the story is quite high. It often feels like an highlight reel and left me wanting for more. I would have like more details about daily life, culture and history. I think a writer like James Clavell would have done more with this subject. But these a small critisms of a extremly well written and engrossing book.

Sushi Bento in Leiden

2011-08-09T11:23:00.003+02:00

As I wrote in a previous blog, it can be difficult to find good Asian food in Holland, especially sushi. Most sushi places are cheap all-you-can-eat places where you get big chunk of rice with cold, tasteless fish that as been kept in the fridge for too long. Good sushi should be made ready to order with fresh fish and be served lukewarm. There are exceptions, restaurants with a good sushi bar like Okura in Amsterdam or Kobe in Maastricht, but these are very expansive and out of the way. I had almost giving up my quest to find good sushi in Holland for an affordable price. So it was a great surprise to discover Sushi Bento in the Haarlemmerstraat in Leiden.

Sushi Bento first caught my eye when I saw it was listed as the number #1 restaurant in Leiden on the rating site iens.nl. It’s location on the main shopping street is inconspicuous, and once inside the interior looks a bit like a snack bar with just half a dozen of tables where you can sit. Sushi Bento also provides take-away and delivery from the same counter. so it can take a little while for your order to be done. But don’t let appearances deceive you, there is some great sushi being made here and the wait is definitely worth it!

I was surprised to see a woman preparing the sushi. In Japan, a sushi chef is strictly a profession for men since women are believed to have a higher body temperature, which mean they cannot serve sushi at the optimum temperature. I however couldn’t tell the difference between sushi made by a man or a woman. Everything tasted great.

It appears they don’t have a license to serve alcohol on the premises, beer is only sold “to go” so we choose green tea instead which also goes very well with sushi. We started with some Edamame (soybeans in the pod) as an appetizer and followed with a sushi set consisting of a selection of nigiri (piece of fish on rice), maki (small roll wrapped in seaweed) and pieces from a bigger roll with advocado and spicy salmon. After this we where still ungry and ordered some more nigiri, gunkan (piece of sushi wrapped in sushi), a tempura roll and some miso soup. Everything was delicious. Usually the “California rolls” are too western for my taste, but these where amazing, especially the tempura roll which was very crispy and tasty.

The only points of criticism were that the Edamame was too salty and the sushi rice a bit too loose. The pieces broke apart far too easily when picking them up with chopsticks. Thankfully it is perfectly acceptable to eat sushi with your fingers. However, these are really very small complaints. The final bill for 3 persons was 69 euro, very cheap for the amount and quality of sushi we had!

I can honestly say that this was the best sushi I have had outside of Japan. Even my Japanese partner and her friend who as lived in Japan for 5 years where impressed.

[Disclaimer] the pictures in this blog where taken with my Blackberry. On my next visit I will take better pictures which do more justice to the dishes.

Moesashi

2011-08-09T08:09:00.002+02:00

Last Saturday afternoon I was in Amsterdam with friends. To escape the rain and the crowds from the Gay Pride Parade we dropped by Lambiek. Named after a character from the Belgian comic Suske & Wiske, this "comic gallery, antique- and bookstore" (as they describe it themselves) was opened in 1968 and is the oldest in Europe. It’s also the largest comic book store in the Netherlands with a great collection of mainstream and underground comics. The store looks a bit disorganized with big piles of comics everywhere and bookcases full to bursting, but I find it a pleasure to browse there. It's a nice touch that the comics are organized by author and not by title, it shows a great deal of respect for the creator and makes it a easy to discover unknown works.

I picked up Moesashi by Bert van der Meij, a Dutch cartoonist. I didn’t know the comic nor the artist, but the Japanese medieval setting appealed to me immediately. Moesashi tells the story of the legendary Miyamoto Musashi, a 17th century samurai who never lost a duel and wrote the famous book Go Rin No Sho (The Book of Five rings). The comic begins when the bandit Takezo is captured by the priest Takoean. Takezo is locked up in a dark library where he begins to study. He realizes his errors and changes his name to Moesashi. He then travels all over Japan to improve his sword fighting skills by fighting duels with other swordsmen. But eventually grows tired of fighting and seeks a way out of this violent life.

The dynamic black and white art style and the way the story is told is really impressive The comic is not a single story, but a number of episodes, or rather highlights of Moesashi life. The reader is left to feel in the blanks in between. One scene in particular is beautiful. Moesashi and another swordsman face each other in front of a temple in the snow. The atmosphere that the artist is able to conger is incredible. You feel the cold, the quiet and the impending violence.

Moesashi is not really a graphic novel, but can be described as a literary comic, a retelling of a classic work of literature in comic form. Other examples are De Avonden (Gerard Reve) by Dick Matena and At the Mountains of Madness (HP Lovecraft) by INJ Culbard.

Studying Japanese, a new start

2011-08-04T14:10:00.007+02:00

This week I renewed my commitment to learn Japanese. I took a break from studying for a couple of months, since the course I was following didn't suit me. Learning a new language is suppose to be fun, but I was mostly getting frustrated. It was time to examine the reasons for this and change my approach, because I am still very much committed to learn Japanese.

There seem to be two approaches to language studying. The first consist of picking up a study book and memorizing all the key sentences. The other approach is grammar-centric which states that if you don't know the grammar, you're stuck with whatever tiny number of sentences you are able to memorize. But if you understand how to string the words together, you can make any sentence you want. For example, It’s nice if you know what the word “beer” is in another language but it’s nicer if you know how to offer it to someone.

The course I followed at the University of Leiden at the beginning of the year favored the first approach, skipping the writing system, pronunciation and grammar for the most part and concentrating on memorizing key words and sentences. The textbook that was used during the course was Japanese for Busy People. Unfortunately, this book is written in Romani, the Latin way of writing Japanese and is focused towards business people with lots of conversation trees for business meetings and words like “business card” or “head office”. This didn’t help me to get a good grasp on the fundamentals of the Japanese language which resulted in me mispronouncing words and accentuating certain sounds too much. According to my partner, I spoke Japanese with a French accent. Sufficient to say that this will not do! Sacrebleu!

So, I decided to try the second approach and really understand the language instead of just memorizing some words and sentences. The first step was learning one of the two Japanese syllabaries: the Hiragana. The other syllaby is the Katakana which is used for writing foreign words. The Chinese characters known as Kanji are used to represent entire words so are not considered a syllabary and can be considered all whole different study. To remember the Hiragana I used a very helpful app called Dr. Moku Hiragana. I also payed attention to the stroke order (the way in which you draw the characters) and the special rules on how to use them, like how to extend vowels or use doubled consenents.

Now that I know the 46 Hiragana characters and how to use them, I am slowly working my way through an online course called Human Japanese, which (so far) does a good job of explaining how the Japanese language works and teaches useful phrases and words.

So far I am slowly making progress spending approximately one hour a day learning new words a repeating the hiragana and words I have already learned. Now it’s a matter of discipline to continue studying. And of course to practice a lot which is much easier since I have a Japanese woman around to talk to.

Asian Food in The Netherlands: an introduction

2011-07-01T12:57:00.005+02:00

You can find every type of Asian food in The Netherlands and never have to look hard to find a Chinese, Indonesian, Thai, Japanese or Korean restaurant, especially in the big cities. From all the types of foreign food Chinese food is the most popular. However, it is not authentic Chinese cuisine that is served in Holland, it is a Chinese – Indonesian hybrid that was developed after

Indonesia

became independent from The Netherlands in 1949.

During colonial times the Indonesian “Rijsttafel”, a Dutch word that literally translates to "rice table", became very popular. It consist of a variety of Indonesian dishes accompanied by rice prepared in several different ways. Popular dishes include egg rolls, babi pangang, babi ketjap, sateh, rendang and nasi goreng. It is usually served with krupuk, atjar en serundeng. The rijsttafel was originally created to provide a festive and official type of banquet that would represent the multi-ethnic nature of the Indonesian archipelago.

When

Indonesia

became independent many Indonesian and Chinese moved to Holland and they brought their cuisine with them. A lot of these immigrants started restaurants where they offered the rijsttafel, adding dishes from Chinese cuisine like tjap tjoi, ku lo yuk and foo yong hai. Most restaurant are now run by Chinese people and the food, although still a mix from Indonesian and Chinese cuisines, is known to Dutch people simply as Chinese food.

The Chinese also adapted the dishes to better suit Dutch taste. This basically meant offering a lot of food for a very cheap price. This was made possible buy using local ingredients instead of importing Chinese products. They also introduced take-away in Holland. As a result Chinese food became known as quick, easy and cheap which made it very popular. “Met het bord Chinees op schoot Studio Sport kijken”, eating Chinese food on the couch in front of the TV while watching the weekly soccer results on Sunday evening is a Dutch tradition . “Sambal bij?” which means “do you want spicy sause with that?” is a catch phrase that every Dutchman knows. Unfortunately, since quality is less important than price, jokes about disappearing cats around Chinese restaurants are also very common.

Apart from Vietnamese egg roll which can find at stands on any market square, this Chinese food was basically the only type of Asian food you could get everywhere in the Netherlands until the mid 90’s. But then Holland went through a social and culinary revolution. More immigrants from all over the world came to The Netherlands and a new generation of Dutch people grew up who where tired of eating the same food that there parents ate. Due to the economic boom this generation was also richer and travelled more which enabled them to experience more diverse food. I still remember what an eye (and tastebud) opener it was to eat real Chinese food while on a holiday in

China

in 2005. This resulted in more ingredients becoming available in the supermarket and a greater diversity of restaurants.

Unfortunately, even today it can still be challenging to find a good Asian restaurant that serves authentic dishes. A lot of Chinese restaurant owners where aware of the changing trends and switched to so called Wok restaurants or Japanese cuisine. For example, one of the two Chinese restaurant in my village switched from Chinese to Korean to Japanese food in the span of two years! Since the chefs of these restaurants are not trained in this style of cooking and offering a lot of food for a low price still is the prevailing business model, the quality is often not that good. This has resulted in Japanese food mostly being associated with all-you-can-eat sushi places.

Thankfully, if you make effort and do a little online research you can find plenty of restaurants that serve tasty authentic dishes, and their number a growing every day since people are becoming more critical about the quality of their food. Although you will always have a lot of Dutch people who continue to go to the Chinese restaurants around the corner on Sunday evening.

The Ultimate Salade Niçoise and other dishes

2011-06-22T21:23:00.001+02:00

I love to cook. And since I am not on my own anymore but living with a Japanese gourmet who really appreciates good food I have a good reason to wear an apron (a very nice one which she got for me I must add).

However, after reading the book Kitchen Confidential by former chef Antony Bourdain I realize cooking is about more than looking like an Izakaya chef and collecting nice recipes. That is the easy part. Bourdain states that cooking is foremost about consistency and cost-performance ratio. The greatest challenge for a Michelin-star chef is not inventing recipes, it’s making the same dishes 30 times a day with ingredients of varying quality and serve them for a price that enables his restaurant to be competitive but still make a profit. I believe the same applies for home cooking, although thankfully with a lot less stress!

I like to taste the individual flavours in my meals, so I prefer simple recipes that don’t use many different ingredients. I am very critical about the quality of these ingredients. I usually go to a good butcher, fish store and cheese shop. Vegetables and Fruits are a bit challenging since there are no specialty stores in my direct neighbourhood but there is a Turkish grocery store nearby with a good selection. Markets are also a great place to do groceries since I can find everything in one place, often for a lower price. Shopping this way takes more time and is generally more expensive, but I can really tell the differences. It basically makes the difference between a great meal and a mediocre one without extra effort while doing the actual cooking.

Like a restaurant a household also has to consider money. It’s easy to splurge on ingredients for a luxurious meal once in a while, but what if you want to eat well every day? That means planning ahead and trying to (re)use the same ingredients for a couple of meals. For example, the day before yesterday I made a Salade Niçoise which required among other things cherry tomatoes, black olives, capers and basil. Yesterday I made pasta with cod in a tomato sauce using the left over ingredients from the previous day. The fish and two cans of tomatoes was all I needed to buy. And the left over sauce will be used with fried rice for another meal. I’m also trying to use as much vegetables and fruits witch are in season, like asparagus and chicory currently.

But there is still much room for improving myself. I still need to plan what to prepare in advance and make a grocery list. I would like to be able to go shopping and decide what to make based on which ingredients are on sale or look especially appealing. But I guess that is a skill you develop with experience. For now I am happy with succeeding in making one nice meal a day.

Portal 2

2011-04-27T19:51:00.010+02:00

If I compare videogames to movies I could say that I like art house more than the big silly Hollywood production. I prefer a great story, a beautiful art style or original gameplay to mindless shooting enemies in a boring middle eastern, fantasy or science fiction setting. That is why in recent year I have become more and more excited about smaller independent games that are released on PSN, XBLA or for iOS. Games like Limbo, Flower, Stacking or Swords and Sworcery offer a unique experience for a fraction of the cost of a commercial release.

One of the exception to this rule are games created by Valve. They are one of the few big developers that succeed in combining the above mentioned elements in a “big” release. Unfortunately It usually takes them a very long time to create a game, so when one is released, It is always a big event (for me anyway). After the excellent Half Life 2 and cooperative zombie shooting game Left 4 Dead, Portal 2 was finally released last week.

The original Portal was an extra bonus added in the so called Orange Box (a compilation of Half Life 2 and episodes 1 and 2 for consoles), but it turned out to be my favourite game of the lot. Portal is basically a first person puzzle game in which you have to navigate various chambers created by a rogue A.I called GlaDOS. You do this by using a so called “portal gun”, a teleporting device that enables you to create an entry and exit portals. It’s bit difficult to explain, but this video shows how it works.

The game is only 5 hours longs but offers a truly unique experience. Original game play, challenging puzzles and a great story that is told mostly through the atmosphere, events and graffiti on the walls. It is also worth mentioning that the game is very, very funny, especially the dialogue of GlaDOS which resulted in the now legendary line “The Cake is a Lie”.

With Portal 2, Valve has expanded that magic into a full length game. With 8-9 hours the single player game is still not very long, but every minute is a feast. Valve are masters at pacing a game, there is no “down time” in which the player is bored or you have the feeling you are just walking towards a next event. You can also tell they spend years polishing the game, the puzzle and level design are more elaborate, as is the dialogue. Portal 2 is even funnier than the original. The graphics are incredible. Sure there are more beautiful games, but Valve really manages to create a sense of place and shows some terrific architecture in what is now the weathered and worn out Aparture Labatories.

Currently I’m about half way through the single player game, and if Sony ever manage to get PSN up and running again, I still have the separate co-operative mode to look forward to. But I already can tell this is a game I will reply many times and that I will use as an example to illustrate to people that games can be a valid art form.

Embracing Defeat

2011-04-11T20:09:00.010+02:00

Today I finished reading Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II, a history book about the occupation of

Japan

by the

United States

which lasted from the end of World War II until 1952.

This is a period of history that I have always been interested in. How did militaristic societies like

Germany

and

Japan

develop into flourishing economies and democracies so quickly? Why isn’t it working today in countries like

Afghanistan

and

Iraq

Japanese history is also something I have become more interested in due to personal circumstances. Here I am, firmly committed to spend the rest of my life with a wonderful Japanese woman while just over half a century ago my uncle and his family were imprisoned in a Japanese prison camp in

Indonesia

How did

Japan

turn into the unique, friendly and fascinating country it is today in just one generation?

The level of destruction inflicted on Japan during the second World War was astonishing. The entire country lay in ruins. Most of the major cities were destroyed and its people on the brink of starvation. Then they were millions of dispersed military personal and civilians all over Asia. Also, the Allies were not in a forgiven mood. Some policymakers in the

United States

even advocated annihilating the entire Japanese race. Thank God cooler heads prevailed and what followed is an amazing tale of a country and people reinventing themselves and embracing democracy and pacifism. This went with ups and downs, and mistakes were made by both sides because people didn’t understand each other and each others culture. But one cannot deny the result.

I learned a lot about Japanese society, thinking and the role of the Emperor. And I was astonished how liberal the

United States

government was before the Cold War. I also read about some unknown historical facts about my own country: all Allied nations conducted their own war crimes trials in Asia but the country that by far condemned the most Japanese soldiers to death was Holland.

Amazon.com will be very happy with me since this book has made me curious to read about other historical topics like the Indonesian war of independence, Douglas MacArthur and Japanese history, especially the Meiji Period.

Reading this book has also helped me to put the terrible earthquake that happened last month into perspective. I am confident that Japanese people will overcome this terrible ordeal, they did it before and they will do this again. But this time they don't need to do it alone. One can see how far the country has come by looking how the world community reacted to this disaster: with sympathy and by offering to help.

Watashiwa no namae Mark desu

2011-02-09T13:55:00.002+01:00

Yesterday evening I started a Japanese class at the University of Leiden. It is an introductory course consisting of 12 two hour sessions. These are the first steps on what will be a very, very long journey towards hopefully being able to understand, read and speak Japanese.

Why learn Japanese since my girlfriend speaks perfect English? First of all her family and some of her friends don’t speak English and it would be nice to actually understand what they say to me without relaying on a translator all the time. Also, I think it will help me to understand Japanese culture and customs more and make it easier to travel around the country. Not to mention being able to play games before they are released in Europe. Finally, I am curious about what opportunities will present themselves if I am able to speak Japanese, even if it's just a little.

It is challenging to learn something new and I realized that being challenged is a feeling that I have missed these last couple of years. After finishing college and starting to work I’ve had a lot of in-company training and many business courses, but these were all within the same field. This is the first time in 10 years that I will actually try to learn something totally new (!) I just hope my brain will be able to cope.

I am confident that I can succeed. I have always been good with languages. I speak Dutch, French, English and some german. Also the kanji (Chinese signs) appeal to my artistic side. I use to draw a lot when I was younger, but lost interest when computers, girls and beer came into my life. For me it still feels like every word is a small painting instead of a bunch of letters.

There is something very appealing about the Japanese language. It’s so different and at first glance it seems not only daunting but totally incomprehendible. But there is a logic to it, and although the grammar is very different from western languages, it is very organized which I like.

So now it is just a question of time and discipline. Studying, repeating and practicing. I will write about my progress on this site and who knows, in a couple of years might even write a blog in Japanese!

Carlos

2011-01-25T20:54:00.005+01:00

Most people don’t know or don’t remember that in the 70’s and 80’s terrorism was even more prominent than now. Inspired by the victory of the Vietcong during the Vietnam War, the PLO and other organizations started fighting for a free Palestina in the Middle East. In Western Europe, a number of idealistic groups where formed who fought for independence of a region or a socialist revolution. Even well-behaved

Japan

had its own terror group, the JRA, who attacked the French embassy in The Hague in 1974. All these groups had one thing in common: they considered themselves socialist, communist and/or anti-imperialistic. As a result, a lot of them where supported by the Soviet-Union who saw this as a mean to fight American interest in Western Europe and the Middle East during the Cold War.

The most well know terrorist attack that happened during this time was the hostage taking of Israeli athletes during the Olympic Games in Munich in 1972. The repercussions of the Mossad, the Israeli secret service, after these events threw further oil on the fire and led to other large and small terrorist attacks in the following two decades. This part of history as been overshadowed by the end of the Cold War and the rise of extreme Muslim terrorism which brought terror to a new level.

Personally, these are events and organizations I was vaguely aware of. I kind of remember seeing it a lot on the news, especially since I lived in Paris around the time these events took place. But I was to young to comprehend what was happening and why at the time.

However, recently more and more stories are being told through movies and TV-series. Probably because persons who grew up during this time are now in positions where they can get these movies made and people are becoming more interested in the roots of the current threats we are facing.

Last year I saw the excellent two-part movie Mesrine, the true story of a charismatic French gangster who mocked and embarrassed the authorities. He also flirted with the extreme left which ultimately gave the French secret service a good excuse to get rid of him by gunning him down in.

After coming to term with the figure of Hitler in Der Untergang,

Germany

is now making movies about other dark pages from its history books. They made the Das Leben der Anderen about living under the eyes of the Stasi in Eastern Germany and Der Badder Meinhof Komplex about the terrorist group The Red Army Faction (RAF) which kidnapped and killed some important German politicians and Industrialist.

Finally, last weekend I saw Carlos, a three-part television mini-series about Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, better known as Carlos the Jackal, a convicted Venezuelan terrorist. After several (often failed) bombings, he achieved notoriety for a 1975 raid on the OPEC headquarters in Vienna. For many years he was among the most wanted international fugitives. In a little more than 5 hours, the life story of Carlos is depicted through a fine character study of a vain man driven by ego who hides behind noble motives. But you also get a history lessons of the most important events that took place in those turbulent years and the political intrigues going on behind the scenes orchestrated by countries like

France

Syria

, the Soviet-Union and East-Germany. It maybe “only” be a TV-series, but it’s one of the most engrossing movies I have seen in a while.

What is an Izakaya?

2011-01-11T13:15:00.003+01:00

So, the first post on the restart of my blog. What should it be about? Maybe explaining the title is a good topic.

An Izakaya is a Japanese drinking establishment where you can also get food to accompany the drinks. The food is usually more elaborate than that served in regular bars. The name "izakaya" is composed of "i" (to sit) and "sakaya" (sake store). This shows that izakaya’s originate from sake stores that allowed customers to sit at the premises to drink. An izakaya can usually be recognized by a red paper lanterns ("aka chochin") hanging in front.

There are a wide variety of izakayas offering all sorts of dishes, but some items are almost always available in any izakaya. Most dished are designed to be shared. Yakitori (grilled chicken skewers), kushiyaki (grilled meat or vegetable skewers), sashimi (slices of raw fish), karaage (bite-sized fried chicken), edamame (boiled and salted soybean pods), tofu and tsukemono (pickles).

During my trips to Japan I was fortunate enough to have visited different types of izakaya’s. Like izakaya’s that specialise in yakitori. These are usually small places where you sit or stand at the bar, the skewers are grilled in front of customers. I also visited a small izakaya run by an old couple where regular customers have their own labelled bottles of sake behind the bar. And finally, huge well lit izakaya’s where the dishes are written on plaques and displayed on the walls. There are also some high-end izakaya's whith stylisch interiors and Michelin star quality food. I haven’t been to those places yet, but I’ve read a book about them.

Probably not etirely accurate, but I think of izakaya’s as the Japanese versions of Irish pubs or Dutch “bruin cafés". But with a lot better food! They have a cozy and warm atmosphere. People always seem to have a good time there. Hanging out with friends or just having a beer and something to eat after a long workday. Also, it’s like stepping back in time to a more simpler time. Especially in a city like Tokyo were your senses are continuously being overwhelmed with neon advertising, trendy places and the most ludicrous (and expensive) cocktails. An izakaya is like a quiet safe heaven, like a traditional tea house in a park but more mjummie.

So, if you are ever in Japan. Be sure to visit one. In the meantime. Check this funny video for a course how to behave!